Prostitution In The Nazis Essay

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One last group to consider is prostitutes, whose experience further demonstrates that the Third Reich did not treat all sexual deviants in a uniform way. Although the Nazis were strictly opposed to prostitutes in theory, their actions were inconsistent. While some prostitutes spent time in concentration camps, others were sent to institutions, and others faced no penalties. Meanwhile, the Nazis tried to restore regulated brothels, even in camps. While at first the history of prostitutes appears as a narrative of escalating repression, the reality was not so simple.
As with gays and lesbians, the history of prostitutes within the Third Reich can be understood in relation to the type of threat the Nazis believed these sexual outsiders to pose.
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Although they initially opposed the reinstitution of brothels, banned in 1927, that stance slowly weakened, and in 1939 the Nazis began to re-establish state-regulated brothels. By mid-1944, they had even been established in eight major concentration camps for SS men and to reward productive prisoners. Despite many women having been sent there on account of prostitution, as Margit Feldman recalls, at Auschwitz good-looking female inmates were often taken away by camp guards and forced to serve as camp …show more content…
Whether they ever believed prostitution was as severe a threat as they once claimed, by the late 1930s they saw it as helpful, at least in regulated form. It would help combat homosexuality and interracial intercourse, and, in wartime, would raise soldiers’ morale and keep venereal disease from spreading, as brothel prostitutes would be closely monitored. The Nazis’ increasing repression of street-prostitution can also be understood within this context, as that was necessary to establish the dominance of brothels. Overall, any threat the Nazis believed prostitution as a whole to pose was mitigated by pragmatic considerations in a way that homosexuality was

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